


Red Hots

by justanotherStonyfan



Series: Sugar 'Verse [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gangsters, Coercion, Illegal Activities, M/M, Minor fistfight, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-31
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2019-03-11 20:40:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13532136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanotherStonyfan/pseuds/justanotherStonyfan
Summary: Isn't like he's being asked to walk around half-naked, and nobody'll know, nobody'll be able to tell, not with him sitting pretty at a desk for the three seconds it takes a man to walk past him. But Steve'll know. Mr Barnes, Buchanan, will know





	Red Hots

**Author's Note:**

> For [Msmynx](https://msmynx.tumblr.com/) who sent me a lovely ask that said, _Would you consider a story where Steve realizes he’s got a type too? And Bucky’s it_
> 
> Thank you for your compliments and your interests, and yes. Yes I would.

By the time it's been a couple of months, most of Buchanan's clients greet him by name, and politely. Flaherty don't work for 'em no more, and Steve's glad of it sure. Hell of a man, Flaherty – the ability to piss off anyone in a five mile radius, and Steve ain't no coward, no sir, but he don't like the look of Barnes senior comin' in to give a man what for, which he did a few times for Flaherty.

Steve doesn't know what Flaherty's doing now. Hasn't asked. Knows better. 

Steve, thank the Lord, has not yet, in the short time he's been with them, been on the receiving end of Senior's wrath. He hopes he never will be, and he keeps to his books and his papers, running out for sandwiches and sorting out coffee and cigarettes. And winter's always brought with it an abundance of the difficulties Steve often finds at that time of year, but it ain't so bad when you're inside and sitting in a nice, heated building, instead of outside on docks or on a corner selling papers.

Steve always calls Senior by his title and his surname to his face, and Senior otherwise. Steve needs to be a lot further along in his service before he starts referring to Senior by given name. Rebecca insists he call her Becca, right about the same time he greets her with a warm smile and a “Ma'am.” She dresses in suits sharper even than Buchanan's sometimes, and he knows what clubs she visits 'cause he's been asked to fetch her once or twice. He says not a word about it to anyone, course – doesn't know who's in the know and who ain't, and ain't about to risk it. 

He still isn't all in on what figures he's doing, what names and whatnot that they're running. Doesn't matter, 'cause it's steady work and steady pay and Buchanan _even paid him the days he was sick,_ and all. Asked if he wanted a Doctor, asked if he needed a hand. Sent Allan around with a _bowl of his mother's soup,_ so help him, and Steve nearly had a heart-attack opening his door that day. Callin' in sick and then find muscle like _Allan_ on his doorstep had him more'n a little perturbed, but he was nice as pie. Watching a man the size of a brick shithouse warm soup was the sort of surreality Steve thought might have been a fever dream 'til he woke up and found the crockery still there.

Steve knows Buchanan is, for the most part, a second in command. He's got his eyes open and his ear to the ground and a lot of his people come in and just talk. That figures, Steve decides, because you need to know what's going on the streets if you're gonna run 'em. So Buchanan gets updates – he's also involved in meeting those people his father ain't got time for, to make sure that kind of reschedule isn't taken as a snub. 

And he runs stuff, but Steve ain't fool enough to ask what. When Buchanan gets on about deliveries, Steve only listens if he means letters and parcels. Anything else, he provides names and numbers and knows naught else about it. He writes letters, he answers the telephone, he gets sandwiches and runs errands. He talks to those who come in and out, send messages to them that can't, and he moves between Bucky's office and the morgue – sometimes more often than other times – because, of course, they ain't just a front.

This is a funeral director's. This is Barnes, Barnes & Barnes, and they have appointments with people who come in and talk to Buchanan, and they have appointments with families decked out in black who come in and talk to Mr James Barnes the funeral director.

Rebecca walks in one day with a cigarette in a long, black holder, and a smile on her lips. Her hair's slicked back, like maybe ten, fifteen years ago, and in waves against her head. She's a hell of a dame, and he knows she's seen him notice.

“Afternoon, Stevie,” she says, as always, and he smiles, stands until she tells him to sit.

“Ma'am.”

“Is my darling brother available?” and Steve holds out a hand.

“He will be shortly, Ma'am,” he says. “Might I get you a coffee while you wait?”

She laughs.

“If history's anything to go by, you can get me two!” she says, and he smiles.

He tucks his glasses into his breast pocket, rolls up his sleeves. It's warm in here, despite the biting cold outside. She's got a fur collar and a pair of gloves, and he's seen her swinging a cane before – she's dapper as a dandy most days, and she's always got a smile and a nice word for him.

He makes her the coffee, talks to her a while, and she raises her eyebrows at him when Buchanan's last client leaves. 

“Into the fire!” she says, and Steve laughs again.

She's about as far from serious as she gets. She'll be with Buchanan an hour or so, maybe a little more but, as for fire, the heating in here is turned up to a point where Steve...

Well, his Ma always said, 'Horses sweat, men perspire, and ladies glow all over.' Now Steve, he ain't got a clue how Becca Barnes always glows the way she does, but Steve is sure perspiring now. Buchanan's got the heating turned all the way up – must do – 'cause it's the middle of winter and he can afford to do so but, damn if it ain't sappin' Steve's energy. He don't got all that much to start with.

He waits half an hour, until he's starting to drip onto the desk, and then he shakes his head. He can't go on like this, not at all. He stands, takes off the jacket and folds it, sets it on the back of the chair and winces with how damp it is. He rolls his sleeves up, too, but it's no use. After another fifteen minutes, he's gotta take the vest off too, and he folds that just as neat as the jacket.

Which is why, after the next fifteen minutes, he's sitting where he is in nought but a shirt and tie and his suspenders when Rebecca leaves. She don't bat an eye, and wishes him well. Buchanan, however, sees her out, and then turns to Steve.

“Listen, Sweetheart,” he says softly, “this ain't a criticism, I'm just lettin' you know, okay?”

And Steve freezes, halfway through checking the appointments list, and looks up at Buchanan.

“What'd I do?” he asks, and Buchanan smiles apologetically.

“I,” he says, and then, “look, you're not in trouble, kid.”

“But?” Steve prompts. 

Buchanan looks awkward, as though it pains him to speak, and Steve shakes his head.

“If I've done something-” he says, but Buchanan holds out his hands.

“Hey, hey, it's okay,” he says, “Lemme just...I mean, I know it ain't easy to...No, damn, that's not what I'm tryin' to- Look, you get sick a lot, right?”

“Sure,” Steve answers – no point denying it when it'd be obvious to anyone, let alone someone who'd already seen him sick, let alone someone who'd already seen him fired from his previous job for it.

“I try to keep a professional air around the place,” he says. “You know how it is.”

“Sure,” Steve answers again, although he doesn't really – he's pretty sure this is professional enough.

“All I mean is,” Buchanan elaborates, “if you're getting too warm in that three piece, I'd rather you took off your undershirt than your weskit, you know?”

Steve tries to ignore the flush he feels spreading across his cheeks, knows Buchanan must have seen the the way his gaze drops awkwardly for a moment.

“Right,” Steve says. “Of course, I'm...I can do that.”

“And I mean, it's not a huge problem, you know. Long as you've got on your suspenders and your tie. And we'll pick you up some sleeve garters. Maybe a thinner shirt, too,but-”

“Of course,” Steve tells him, picking up his waistcoat again. “I'll just-”

“Only, if someone walks in..." Buchanan continues.

“Yeah,” Steve nods, already pulling the waistcoat back on. 

“I mean, I forego underclothes entirely,” Steve tries not to choke, “I don't know about how that'd see you.”

“Yeah, I don't know about that,” Steve says, and Buchanan laughs.

“You just wait,” Buchanan says, as Steve walks out to find the men's room. “Even you couldn't be cold in here in summer. Won't need the heatin' then!”

Steve feels like a fool, feels like an idiot for it. Of course it don't look professional to be sitting around in shirt and tie when everyone else is looking sharp as hell, of course it wouldn't make the right impression if someone walked in.

He closes, and locks, the stall behind him, leaning against the door as soon as the bolt slides home. Even the damned bathrooms are nice here, tiled in beige and maroon with gilded edges. And Steve pays it no attention at all, trying to keep his breathing even.

He can't just sit and swelter, not because it isn't nice to be warm for once. Because it really, really is nice to be warm for once. But how professional would it look to greet Mr Barnes' callers with his hair stuck to his head and dark patches emanating from his underarms and stretching halway down his chest? Worse, if he were soaked to the bone in somewhere so warm in the middle of such a bitter winter, it'd make leaving that warmth all the more dangerous. Two minutes outta here and he'd have a chill and be lucky to not have pneumonia again by the time he reached home.

He takes a few seconds just to breathe, to slow his pounding heart a little. Why the hell is he so worked up about this, what's the problem his body's having that his mind ain't telling him?

He pushes himself back to stand, and takes off the waistcoat, hanging it on the one brass coat-hook on the door with the care befitting such an expensive garment. He has remember to detach the pocket-watch first – a gift for his eighteenth birthday that had, apparently, been his father's – before he hangs the waistcoat up. The tie's easy, a knot to unpick and a length to sling over the top of the door, his suspenders, too. Sideways and down and they hang from his hips.

But he starts to fumble on reaching his shirt.

Up until that moment, there'd been nothing amiss in his mind, it all made perfect sense. But like this, with only a thin, expensive barrier between the world and his undershirt, he realizes how naked he's gonna feel when he takes it off. Once, at the age of eleven, it had rained in the middle of an afternoon, and all the laundry on the line had been soaked through – his other three pairs of underwear included. Thankfully, it had been neither a school-day nor a Sunday, so he'd had nowhere to be, but he'd still spent the whole day sittin' in the same place, mortified at the prospect of having to go without his underclothes.

He feels about the same way now.

Sure, it's only an undershirt. Isn't like he's being asked to walk around half-naked, and nobody'll know, nobody'll be able to tell, not with him sitting pretty at a desk for the three seconds it takes a man to walk past him. But Steve'll know. Mr Barnes, Buchanan, will know, and that's...

That makes his heart beat a little faster and his stomach flip over.

Obviously Buchanan thinks nothing of wanderin' around without underwear, and Steve'd never have known if Buchanan hadn't volunteered that information. And part of Steve is all in a fix about it, about knowing that fact and being well aware that some part of him will always be aware of it from this point onward – that every time he looks at Buchanan, there'll be a little piece of him that knows.

And that comes with the knowledge that there'll probably, from this point forward, be a part of Buchanan knows it about Steve, too.

Steve makes himself open his shirt, button by button, tugging it out from his waistband. At least, with trousers tailored so well, he doesn't have to make a grab for his pants. And it might be the tiled walls or maybe it's plain anxiety, but he's cold by the time he shrugs his shirt back off shoulders that, even in his periphery, look to droop, sharp and pale.

 _All knees and elbows,_ he thinks to himself, can't even remember no more who'd said it to him in the first place.

He slings the shirt up over the door as well and stares at it, at the gorgeous, crisp whiteness of it. And then he looks down.

Even his undershirt's smooth, fitted, white, even that feels soft and welcome against his skin. He's sure he'll grow used to the crispness of the shirt against his skin instead, sure that it can't irritate for long, won't be strange and new for any great length of time.

Still, as he steels himself and tugs the hem up, the air making goosebumps rise on his skin, he's glad to be alone, feeling instantly as exposed as if he's changing in a store window. Isn't just goosebumps that the cold's raising, but the thicker fabric of the waistcoat'll cover that until he warms again,

He's just tugged the undershirt over his his head and slung it over the top of the door, about to snag the shirt on the way down, when he hears the door to the men's room open, and goes still.

“You all right in here?” Buchanan's voice asks, and Steve feels the flush rise in his cheeks.

Why, why does Buchanan have to come in when Steve really _is_ half naked? Why couldn't he have come waltzing on in maybe twenty seconds later? Steve hasn't been that long, ain't no need for a search party yet.

“Sure-” he says, but it don't come out like a word and he has to clear his throat and start over, “Sure, I'm just bad with my hands. Buttons took me longer'n I thought.”

And then he's rollin' his eyes at himself 'cause are you kiddin' me? _That's_ the best excuse he can come up with? 

“Sure,” Buchanan answers. “Just thought I'd make sure you're all right.”

Steve snags the shirt anyway, shrugs it on as fast as he can and tries not to think about how it's cool on his skin, how it's damp in places and feels like just about the worst thing he's ever put on in his life. He hopes it don't leave a mark on the door, either, that'd be disgusting.

He glances up but sees no problem, and he's tucking his shirt back into his pants when Buchanan says,

“I won't have it up so high tomorrow, if you'd like,” and Steve nearly jumps out of his skin 'cause somehow he figured Buchanan must'a left.

“Whatever's best for the office,” Steve says, because he knows, in winters like these, it's the old dears who go during the night when they don't have the money for the medicine or the heat, when they're frail and tired and go to bed but don't get up again. 

The older, the frailer (with Steve as the exception), and the older people appreciate the heat. Some of 'em can't get blood to the tips of their fingers without it.

Steve comes outta the stall once he's got his waistcoat on and buttoned, his watch secured and in his pocket. Buchanan's still waiting for him, leaning against the doorframe like this is a reasonable place to meet, and Steve goes to the sink and the mirror with its tarnished spots, and flips up his collar to do his tie right.

He can see Buchanan watching him but doesn't meet his eyes in the glass. In fact, when his tie is tied and his shirt is sorted out, he picks up the undershirt and glances at Buchanan to find that Buchanan isn't staring at his face anymore.

Steve frowns, twists, checks that his shirt ain't untucked, which it might be from the direction of Buchanan's gaze, but by the time he's checked and smoothed everything out, Buchanan is pushing off the doorframe and leaving. He holds the door for Steve by putting one hand out, and Steve has to duck under his arm. Which means that Steve catches the scent of Buchanan's afterhave – it's nice, rich and deep like sandalwood or cedar, and Steve blushes to think about how nice it is.

“I appreciate it, y'know,” Buchanan tells him, and when Steve looks at his face, he looks like he means it. “Da wouldn't like it an' I know it ain't a nice thing to ask of ya. And what I told you before, I was only foolin'. Trying' to lighten the mood, kid, I didn't mean to put you out.”

Steve takes his seat again.

“It's all right,” he says, “don't worry about it.”

He goes back to his book and Buchanan goes back into his office, and Steve hears him say,

“I'm _gonna_ worry about it though,” before he closes the door.

~

Buchanan drives him home that night, on account of Steve having sweltered the whole day through. 

“We'll turn it down tomorrow, kid,” Buchanan tells him. “Won't be so bad, I'll tell Da about it.”

“You don't have to,” Steve answers, 'cause the thought of pissing off Barnes Sr is not a thought he likes, but Buchanan shakes his head.

“Ain't an inconvenience to me to spend less heatin' the place, ain't an inconvenience to me havin' a secretary who ain't sick, neither. Tomorrow it'll be down some – I ain't got nobody over fifty tomorrow anyhow.”

Steve chews his lip, looks outta the windscreen and thinks it over or, more accurately, thinks about how to say thank you without pushin' the issue further. He doesn't like it. Worse, he knows it's done out of kindness, but he's so used to having to fight his way forward.

“Thank you,” he says, settles on the simplest way to do it, and Buchanan reaches over and squeezes his knee.

“No problem,” he says with a grin.

Steve, however, is absolutely unable to move. 

Steve's a slender kind of kid, legs like twigs and arms like skinnier twigs, and Buchanan's a big guy. Tall, broad, built real nice, he's got big hands, and squeezin' Steve's knee squeezes most of the rest of his leg, too. Considering how Steve's still without his undershirt, he's feeling everything a little more than he might usually, and Buchanan's proximity alongside the searing warmth of his hand and it's particular size and placement...

It's gone a moment later, and Steve finds that his skin is still burning from it. He's still halfway to mortified about the undershirt tucked into his pocket, still all too aware of how little there is between his skin and his shirt. 

When they pull up at the kerb for Steve to get out, he says a polite goodnight, and wonders if he imagines the way Buchanan seems to be watching him very, very closely.

***

Next morning, Steve walks. He takes his undershirt with him in his pocket, and plans to keep it in his desk, clean - which is why he ain't wearing it. He ain't wearing his other one, either - it ain't dry yet, resting in front of the stove at home. As it is, he can see his breath outside while he walks, and he's got the scarf his mother knit him around his neck to keep the cold off his chest, but one of Steve Rogers' main downfalls in life, other than his health, is that, even though he don't match up to nobody, nothin'll stop him telling others to pick on someone their own size.

Which is how Steve Rogers comes to be halfway down an alley by the side of the grocer's down the block, while some kid he don't know is getting' his teeth kicked in by two guys a lot larger than he is. He can hear why, too – they're not exactly being clandestine in their accusations. 

“Whassamatter, ya limp wristed little-”

Granted, Steve can't do much, but he doesn't _have_ to do much. What he has to do, as it turns out, is very little.

“Hey!” he yells, but Steve's piece de resistance, at this particular point, is not the sharpness of his voice, but rather the sharpness of the little rock he manages to find on the ground.

Another of Steve's talents is reasonable aim, so when it cracks off the back of Thug One's skull and pings off in some other direction, it does what it's intended to do, which is cause a distraction. Unfortunately for Steve, as per most of his distractions, they don't just take attention off whomever he's standing up for, but they also turn attention onto him.

Steve's other main downfall in life, aside from his health and his inability to keep his mouth shut, is his absolute and unflinching refusal to turn tail and run.

The kid gets away mainly clean, maybe a bloody nose but not much else. Steve, however, dodges one punch and walks straight into another, and it's not like he's Lacey's size, not like he could stand toe to toe with Allan. It knocks him straight down, and so he pushes back onto his feet and puts up his fists. He thinks later that it's kind of akin to walking into a game of conkers to find yourself up against a sledgehammer, but at the time, he's a little busy to think about it.

He gets a good right hook in and Thug One's head snaps back, but that's it, and then he's taken another fist to his face that drops him in a heap on the paving. Rough hands grab at his jacket, shove him up against the wall.

“What the fuck is this?” one of them says – Steve's having a bit of a hard time following the conversation. “Found me another fairy, huh?”

Steve spits, and then kicks out, but he gets shoved back up against the wall for his troubles and his headache lances through his temples as the guy hauls him up by his lapels.

“Think you can fuckin'-”

And then there follows a long, painful silence, during which Steve begins to wonder if he's gone deaf. 

And then one of 'em says, 

“Shit.”

And _then_ , well. Then Steve's being put _back onto his feet_. He sways dangerously, goes to put up his fists or maybe to grab the nearest thing to keep from falling, but there's hands at his shoulders, another pair that seems to be...dusting him off while the other holds him up?

Steve thinks he must be wrong, they've gotta be lookin' for a wallet, surely. But no, his tie gets straightened and his waistcoat gets smoothed one of 'em, one of 'em _presses a damned hankie_ to Steve's lip. It comes back bloody but the voice says,

“Here, you,” and then a pause. “You keep that, all right? We didn't mean anything by it-”

“Fuck-” says the other.

“-we wouldn't 'a said a word if we'd known who you was.”

Steve frowns, looks at them both.

Who is he?

“Listen,” says Thug Two – whom Steve can identify now he can get his eye open again, “we...we'll make you a deal, all right? Uh, we didn't mean no harm and you'll be all right, so you...ah, maybe you don't gotta tell Mr Barnes about this, huh?” 

Steve blinks. Looks between them. 

His lapel. The silver lily. 

With a couple more seconds of hesitation, he does what he's seen Mr Barnes and Buchanan do both, and straightens his crooked spine as much as it'll go, puts his shoulders back. He threads his fingers through his bangs to straighten his hair and draw this out and swipes his thumb across his lower lip, rubs his fingers together as though he's examining the blood there. And then, very carefully, folds the 'kerchief so the monogrammed corner's on the outside.

“How about,” he says, and he says it low and slow with an air of feigned nonchalance, “maybe if you lay off that kid, _and_ anybody else you might find hangin' around who's of a different persuasion than you...”

The two thugs hold their breath and Steve honest-to-God can't believe this is working.

“...then maybe you can take this hankie back,” he continues, holding it out between fore and middle finger, with the letters clear as day next to the darkening stain of his blood. “And maybe I forget whose initials are on the corner.”

The guy goes to take it and Steve retracts it at the last moment, just curls his fingers just so to flick it back.

“Beg pardon?” he says.

“Sure,” the guy answers. “We didn't mean nothin' by it.”

“Then it's a good job you ain't gonna do it again, now, ain't it?” Steve says, holds out the hankie again, and the two of 'em nod once Thug Two's retrieved it, take a step back like he's a leper, and leave.

Steve stands in the middle of the alleyway, frail as you like and still bleeding, and waits until they turn the corner before he spits blood on the paving. 

Isn't that something?

~

Buchanan turns to look at him as he walks in, grin splitting his face so wide that it's almost funny when it drops off completely.

“Jesus H. Christ, kid,” he says, and he crosses the room in two strides, tucks one hand under Steve's chin while the other goes to Steve's shoulder, his expression and his voice going from shock and concern to dark and dangerous in a split second. “Gimme a name.”

Steve rolls a shoulder even though part of him's warm and strange on the inside from the strength of Buchanan's reaction.

“Honestly, I don't got one,” he says, wincing a little. “They were pickin' on some kid so I stepped in, and they went at me until they caught sight of this.”

Steve flips his lapel forward, watches Buchanan's gaze dip and return. The hand Buchanan has on his shoulder slips down, over his chest, and Steve's abruptly reminded that his undershirt's in his pocket.

“Soon as they saw it, I got put back up, dusted off and given a hankie for the split,” Steve continues, and Buchanan turns Steve's head toward the light a little, a touch less concerned.

Buchanan tuts, says, “Pickin' on some kid, Jesus, _you're_ a kid, kid,” and then lifts his head to yell over the top of Steve's. “Rosie!”

It takes a second or six, but the hulking great structure of Rosie appears in the doorway.

“Fetch me somethin' for a split lip and a black eye, got it?” Buchanan says.

“Boss,” Rosie acknowledges, and off he goes.

“Ach, Stevie, what the hell,” Buchanan mutters. “Nothin' else you wanna tell me?”

“I told 'em if they quit beatin' kids up in alleyways, I'd forget whose initials were on the hankie.”

Buchanan raises one eyebrow.

“Oh?” he says.

“Well, I'm sorry to say but I must've slipped and knocked myself on the sidewalk,” Steve says, eyes clear, gaze unwavering. “I clean forgot 'em.”

Buchanan's other hand, the one at his chin, moves up, sweeps the hair off Steve's forehead with a gesture that's both gentle and familiar as he sighs, palm settling on Steve's other shoulder a moment later.

“What a tragedy,” he says. “You ever get cause to remember, you just let me know.”

Steve nods.

“Boss,” he says.

Buchanan's mouth twitches up at the corner, and Rosie reappears with his hands full of various things.

“Thanks,” Buchanan says, and Rosie brings 'em over as Steve starts to shuck his jacket.

He's halfway to putting a steak on the eye that's going black when Buchanan says,

“So what did they want with the kid, anyhow, these guys that you can't remember?”

And Steve is not a good liar - his poker face is practically a mirror, for God's sakes – so he don't even try it.

“Callin' him a fairy,” Steve answers.

“Was he one?” Buchanan asks and something happens then that Steve doesn't really have much control over.

“Problem if he was?” he says, and he says it easy like, but there's steel behind it. 

A razor's edge, the kind of challenge a man ought not make to his employer. 

Buchanan blinks.

“Uh, I gotta say, that's real noble of you, kid,” he says, “but you've met my sister, ain'tcha? And what, you think Rosie here's called Rosie 'cause he smells so nice?”

Steve's gaze slides across to Rosie, whose mouth also turns up at one corner, and whose gaze slides down over Steve – not unappreciatively either – before coming back up to his face. Then he bobs his brows. Steve feels himself go pink.

“Oh,” he says, small and surprised.

Buchanan huffs a laugh through his nose.

“He ain't the only one either, so don't you worry about our opinions on that subject, a'right?”

Steve nods.

“A'right,” he echoes. “I don't know if he was a fairy or not. It ain't about the facts, though, it was the principle.”

Buchanan nods, and his thumb, slanting down off Steve's shoulder, moves absently against his collarbone through his shirt. He lets go a moment later, and Steve realizes how warm his hands were, how long he had them there for.

“Take off your tie,” Buchanan says, “and we'll clean up that split lip 'fore it runs into your collar.”

Steve watches Buchanan for a few seconds more and a wild part of him wonders if he looks bad enough to ask for help with it. 

“For what it's worth considering you're gonna be working today with one hell of a headache,” Buchanan says, “that's the kind of behavior we actively encourage. You're doin' me proud, Stevie, keep it up. Rosie, you all right to head out for breakfast? I don't want Errol Flynn here kissing concrete with a concussion.”

Steve feels a different warmth then, emanating from his chest and spreading outward like a balm to his injuries, just for a little while. He likes to pretend, too, that Buchanan turns back for a different reason than a better look at his injuries, but Steve ain't a fool – and Buchanan said about Rebecca, and Rosie, but didn't mention anything about being so inclined himself. Steve's not about to risk everything for a question he doesn't need an answer to anyway, for an answer that don't make no difference. Doesn't matter what Buchanan likes – Steve called him 'Boss' 'cause that's what he is. 

It ain't a bad thought to have, though, nor is it the last time he has it.

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to suggest something for this 'verse, I have the same username on Tumblr and take requests!
> 
> In 2012, I sat at my desk job on lunch and scribbled away on a piece of squared paper with a mechanical pencil. Thanks [Msmynx](https://msmynx.tumblr.com/) for suggesting something that meant I could finally use the part of this story that was drafted in 2012, and which was the first part of this whole AU. 
> 
> Yes. That's how long it takes me to get around to the ideas I want to write.


End file.
